An area of land that is covered with a shallow layer of water during some or all of the year is called a(n)

Wetland

A wetland is a shallow land that is either temporary or permanently occupied with water. The water in the wetland comes from rain, irrigation of the agricultural land, river, lakes, ponds, oceans and other water sources. The water of the wetland can be fresh, saline or brackish depending upon the source of water.

explanation:

metals have excess of electrons whereas non-metals have deficiency of electrons. thus, in order to gain stability metals easily donate their electrons to the non-metals.

for example, electronic configuration of sodium is and electronic configuration of phosphorous is .

when a phosphorous atom and sodium atom combine together then sodium will donate is extra one electron to the phosphorous atom. as a result there will be formation of ionic bond between sodium and phosphorous.

the reaction will be as follows.

there, are three sodium sodium atoms and each of them will donate its one extra electron to phosphorous atom. thus, the sub-shell of phosphorous gets completely filled.  

thus, we can conclude that electrons are transferred from atoms of sodium to atoms of phosphorous. this transfer makes the sodium atoms donate one electron and the phosphorous atoms to gain one electron. as a result, the sodium and phosphorus atoms strongly attract each other.